Study investigates impact of lions living alongside giraffe populations

New research from the University of Bristol is calling for an urgent review into how populations of giraffes are managed in the wild when living alongside lions. It is commonly accepted that lions are the only predators to pose a risk to giraffes on an individual basis but there has never been a study to investigate how the presence of lions impacts on the population as a whole. Now, in the first study of its kind, published today in the journal PLOS One , Bristol PhD student Zoe Muller has found that if lions are kept in the same conservation area as giraffes, the number of calves is likely to be reduced, maybe as much as 82 percent. Zoe, based at the University's School of Biological Sciences , said: "It is thought that lions preferentially target giraffe calves in the wild, and there is anecdotal evidence of this, including observations of lions eating young giraffe carcasses and of lion claw marks on adult females (thought to be a result of them defending their calves). "However, no-one has ever investigated if this preference for hunting calves has an impact on the population as a whole." This study investigates how the population demography of giraffes differs between two adjacent sites - one with no lions, and one with a high density of lions, and found that the presence of lions has a significant impact on the demography of giraffe populations. In areas containing no lions, the giraffe population contained 34 percent of juveniles (individuals less than a year old) but in the presence of lions it only contained six percent juveniles.